Even as modern retail gathers momentum, notwithstanding the near lack of support from the government (central and state), a new trend is in the making. This could bring about a fundamental change in retailing as the world thinks of it today and in the way consumers make purchases today. The concept of “any time, anywhere” retailing is different from the existing retail formats other than those solely based on e-commerce. Physical store retail models may offer extended shopping hours, or even a 24x7 operating environment, but customers still have to go to the store. On the other hand, non-store retailing formats such as TV, catalogue, door-to-door or direct multi-level marketing and tele-marketing offer customers varying degrees of flexibility and freedom in terms of location (where to shop), time (when to shop) and the modalities of making payment and receiving goods.
Also, an increasing number of people will value the convenience of “any time, anywhere” shopping for multiple reasons. The most important of these is the increasing time poverty across almost all socio-economic strata other than the ultra-rich and the poor. This time poverty is being exacerbated since an increasing number of women are joining the workforce, a lot of time is being spent at work and hours lost in commuting, more time needs to be spent with children, and socialising and a myriad of other time-consuming activities have become the norm rather than the exception. Thus, it will increasingly become a challenge for most households to find time to go out for shopping, especially the trips made for routine purchases (such as groceries), or purchases that require more time to study and compare product features and understand the price-value equation (such as high-ticket consumer durables), or purchases for which the customer already knows what to buy (a book, DVD or a particular phone handset). For such shopping across several product categories, the customer will increasingly prefer an option that allows her to decide what to buy, place an order and complete the transaction any time and anywhere (at home, in the car, at the airport, at the railway station, even in the train, during lunch at work, during vacation and so on).
Fortunately for consumers, technology is advancing rapidly and in an excitingly converging manner. The penetration of personal computing devices (smart phones, personal computers, notebooks and tablets) is growing exponentially. The penetration (and the quality) of broadband and high-speed internet is likely to undergo a dramatic change as the new licensees rapidly roll out their new broadband networks in the next 12 to 18 months. Electronic payment gateways already exist, and it is relatively simple to integrate them with consumers’ computing devices. And finally, rapid advances in digital imaging and transmission through the internet can make the next generation of product catalogue much more lifelike, and so much more interactive that they can offer customers more (and more precise) information and decision-making support systems than what a typical retail store sales staff can provide.
It is true that in India new business-to-consumer logistics networks – which are capable of reaching out to thousands of towns and hundreds of thousands of villages – have yet to be built. And that will require major financial, technological and managerial resource investments. However, once such networks are put in place, the cost of delivery (and also the cost of taking goods back from the customers in case of any deficiency in the product) is expected to be quite competitive.
At the same time, the “any time, anywhere” shopping model has the potential to have an extremely disruptive impact on retailers with physical stores (and even on other non-store format retailers including TV). This is because the cost of such engagement between the producer and the customer is quite likely to be significantly lower than current costs (and, therefore, the retail markups). Indeed, it may not be too long before questions are raised on the raison d'être for so-called brick-and-mortar retailers!